Co-Authored Creative Standards
Publish shared standards with the team instead of imposing one leader's rules.
- Difficulty
- Moderate
- Time to result
- ~weeks to results
- Steps
- 5
- Confidence
- 99%
Co-Authored Creative Standards is Hoffman's correction to an overly leader-driven way of setting quality expectations. He believes teams should publish an ethos, manifesto, or set of creative and design principles, but says he initially did too much self-authorship: he would leave, write six principles, and return with the rules. The improved mechanism starts with explicit beliefs, then invites people with different opinions to help author, challenge, and complete them. The group builds consensus and publishes the standards so everyone can use the same reference when evaluating details. The principles may change over time, but they should remain visible rather than living only in a leader's taste. Shared authorship does not mean lowering the quality bar; it gives contributors a role in defining what the bar means in practice.
Origin
Hoffman says experience managing teams taught him that returning with self-authored principles was weaker than inviting the team to help create and complete them.
Core principles
- 01Standards become usable when they are explicit and published.
- 02A leader's private ideals do not automatically become team culture.
- 03Different opinions improve the authorship process.
- 04Shared authorship builds consensus and practical ownership.
How to run it
- 1
Make beliefs explicit
Draft the quality, design, or creative beliefs that currently live in leaders' heads. Express them as principles a team could apply to work.
Pro tip Use examples of acceptable and weak work to expose vague wording.
- 2
Invite different authors
Bring in team members who hold relevant expertise and potentially different opinions. Give them real authority to challenge and improve the draft.
Pro tip Include people who will apply the standards daily, not only senior leaders.
Watch out Consultation after the rules are finished is not co-authorship.
- 3
Test the principles
Apply the draft to real examples and debate where it gives conflicting or unhelpful guidance. Revise until the standards distinguish meaningful quality choices.
Pro tip Test edge cases where taste and operating constraints collide.
Watch out Consensus built from abstract wording may disappear during a real review.
- 4
Publish the agreement
Make the agreed ethos, manifesto, or principles available to everyone. Use the same published reference in briefs and reviews.
Pro tip Keep the standards short enough to revisit during active work.
- 5
Evolve deliberately
Review whether the standards still support the team's work and audience. Update them through another explicit process rather than allowing silent drift.
Pro tip Record why a principle changed so the team retains the learning.
Watch out Frequent unexplained changes weaken the shared standard.
In the wild
Hoffman recalls going away and returning to his team with six principles for obsessing over details. He later concluded that he had not involved the team in authoring them and recommends inviting people with different opinions, completing the standards together, and making sure everyone has them.
→ The standards become a shared reference rather than a leader's private declaration.
A content lead drafts five product-writing principles, then asks support agents, designers, and engineers to test them against recent screens. Their disagreements expose one principle that rewards brevity at the expense of necessary guidance, so the team revises it before publication.
→ The final standard reflects both quality ambition and how the product is actually used.
Common mistakes
Presenting finished rules as collaboration
Hoffman identifies his own self-authorship as the flaw; the team needs to participate before the principles are complete.
Leaving standards unpublished
Unwritten taste cannot consistently guide a large team or help people care about the same details.
Freezing standards forever
Hoffman says published ideals can change over time, so evolution should be explicit rather than forbidden.
Is it for you?
Best for
Creative leaders trying to scale attention to detail and consistent quality across a growing team.
Not ideal for
Emergency or compliance rules that require immediate authority rather than a consensus-building process.
From the transcript
“i do believe in publishing whether it's you want to call it an ethos a manifesto a set of principles”
“i was doing a little bit too much self authorship”
“invite folks into the process that have maybe slightly different opinions”
From the episode
The Marketing Genius Behind Nike: Greg Hoffman